Gorgeous coprosmas look after themselves
Question: if you had to choose between a great-looking plant that was complicated to grow, or an equally great-looking plant that was dead easy to deal with, which would you choose? Be honest: you’d pick the unfussy plant. In fact, growing pretty plants that are easy is one of the best ways to be a successful gardener.
Ok, so does that mean you should go ahead and fill your green spaces with the tried and true – lavender, rosemary, daisy – plants that are easy to manage but not exactly gorgeous? Of course you can, but if you have a little time, why not look at plants which are great looking as well as easy to deal with? Let’s take the Pacific™ Coprosmas as an example and see where we get…
1: Eyes shut – is it easy to grow? Before we even think about how good looking these plants are, we need to be certain that they are as straightforward to grow as any lavender bush. Of course they are, and that’s because Pacific™ Coprosmas are the descendants of the New Zealand mirror bush. You know the one: it’s that tough beast of a wind-break plant that thrives in salt spray and dry conditions. These survivor characteristics have been passed on down to the Pacific Coprosmas thanks to the skill of plant breeders, so that the gorgeous Coprosmas Pacific Sunrise and Pacific Sunset not only look great, but thrive hands-free.
2: Eyes open – how good looking is it? Now it’s time to open our eyes and check these coprosmas out purely on the basis of their looks. Remember, it’s good to have easy to grow plants but not if they are Plain Janes. These are both really lovely. Starting with Coprosma Pacific Sunrise, the leaves are small and slightly ruffled which gives the overall plant a really nice overall texture. The core of each leaf is chocolate brown but then the edges look like they’ve been dipped in pink. Add a bit of sunlight and you’ve a glowing moment. The Coprosma Pacific Sunset version is a bit more adult: it has the same ruffled foliage but this time the leaf is often a deep red with the edges dipped in chocolate. If you stand back and look at both plants they share the same glossy finish and both grow into soft dense mounds.
3: So do these coprosmas deliver enough to earn them a place in the garden? For lots of reasons, yes. Because they grow fast into a healthy dense bush without you doing anything. Of course you can clip them into classically crisp hedges, but you could also just as easily let them grow into hedges or bushes that are soft and natural. Another good reason to plant them is that they look good all year around, unlike some plants that look a bit invisible or just ordinary until they pop into flower for a few short weeks. And if you’ve ever wondered what garden structure was all about, it’s simple. To help a planting scheme look good all the time, it needs a framework of constant plants, things that will always look really nice. Pacific Coprosmas are a good example. There might be some fluffy plants coming in and out of flower, but if you have some of these dependable Pacific Coprosmas in the mix the whole effect will look very professional (no surprise really as landscapers make good use of them). One other thing to mention is that apart from giving them the courtesy of establishment waterings, these coprosmas don’t need feeding or spraying for bugs etc. And if you’ve mulched around them to stop any weeds creeping into the picture, they really are zero maintenance plants.
